


Some Assembly Required

by counterheist



Series: porno au [a.k.a. extra meaty] [2]
Category: Hetalia: Axis Powers
Genre: I bet Cloud Cuckooland has an IKEA, I don’t write Finland moe, IKEA, M/M, no I don’t think all Finns are alcoholics, porno au, stupid jokes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-05-30
Updated: 2012-05-30
Packaged: 2017-11-29 11:30:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,535
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/686466
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/counterheist/pseuds/counterheist
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Berwald Oxenstierna walks into an IKEA looking for cheap furniture. He gets a bookcase, two defective chairs, and a crush on a drunken sales associate. Oh.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Some Assembly Required

**Author's Note:**

> What passes for plot totally yoinked from [this video](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=98CtwjyuAI8).

Tino is a man in his thirties, with a body that stalled in his twenties, and a face that stopped aging somewhere around nineteen. Tino was born in Turku, grew up in Helsinki, and currently lives in a grimy apartment off of Piazza Something Something near the Via Something-io. Tino, at one point, could speak five languages fluently, and still holds on to three and a half, so up yours to all of the jackasses up on the show floors who snicker when he can’t even remember what his address is. Tino isn’t always drunk at work, but when he is, he prefers to be half a bottle away from falling over.

It makes things more interesting.

Besides, in an hour his last shift is over, and never again will he have to plaster on a smile and help the incompetent masses of Lazio figure out how to navigate a store that has arrows on the _fucking floors_.

Okay.

Okay.

Tino’s got this.

He has it.

He has got it in his hands.

He has got it in his hands just like a fish. A trout. A _rainbow_ trout, okay, maybe that was too much, too fast, maybe that comparison was too good. Tino has to relax against a pile of waste bin holder… things… for a second to get his breath back and to make sure the bargain cutlery section stops being on the ceiling. He waves at all the people who come up to talk to him, points towards the poor bastards who have to staff the indoor plant sections, and says ‘bene’ a lot. They get it.

And by ‘get it’, Tino means they go bother someone else. He’s cool with that. It’s cool. It’s all cool. Everything is winter ice, naked and screaming outside the sauna and woah. Woah. When did all of Tino’s memories get infused with vodka? Here he is making another one, quitting this hellhole, and he’s three sheets to a full-blown tempest. Maybe he should stop. He wouldn’t want to lose the rainbow mind-fish in his hands which he left by the bin full of spatulas for safekeeping.

The mind-fish.

Not his hands.

Or the spatulas.

A quick nap in the staff lounge later, and Tino feels better. By better he means lucid. And by lucid he means almost-lucid. All right: Tino has regained his ability to feel, and now he’s ready to get back to the bargain section and hope nobody hits him with her purse. Or his purse. Italian men have a lot of purses, and they must keep goddamn bricks in them, really. Sometimes when the customers get cranky it feels like Tino’s nine again and getting bodychecked by Timo the Forest Dragon Comb Beast from four years up. Timo always made fun of Tino’s name. Tino always put rubber cement in Timo’s shoes. It seemed fair at the time.

More fair than the thing with the vole.

Tino doesn’t regret the thing with the vole.

“‘scuse me,” someone says, and Tino opens his eyes to register the pale grey ceiling that is much further away than it’s supposed to be. He must have drifted to the warehouse at some point between helping an old couple pick out a plastic flower vase and dry heaving behind the shower curtain display. In theory, the warehouse isn’t part of Tino’s post today, but it’s not as much of a difference from bins of plastic knives and forks as the show floor would have been. Or the checkout aisles. Or the restaurant where nobody eats.

Tino can’t blame them, because who goes to IKEA to eat things?

Lost in thought, Tino doesn’t answer the voice. Instead he tries to guess which part of the warehouse he’s in from the shape of the box he’s lying on. It’s almost as long as Tino is tall, but it’s strangely lumpy. Probably not a table; maybe a chair. Most definitely Defect Goods.

“You…” the voice hesitates, choosing its words, “alive?”

“Probably,” Tino answers. “It depends on what you want from me.”

If the owner of the voice wants in on Tino’s flask, then Tino is dead. Respectable people don’t steal alcohol from corpses, and neither do Italians or Greeks or Swedes or Russians on most days. If Tino’s mother could hear his thoughts right now he’d be in for it, but she can’t because she’s hours away, and also not psychic, and also tells ethnic jokes just like everybody else. Tino wonders if the owner of the voice knows the one about the Poles and the light bulbs. Then he wonders if he needs another nap in the break room, because _everybody_ knows the one about the Poles and the light bulbs.

Before he can ask, to make sure, the voice becomes the most terrifying thing Tino’s seen since he last walked past the restaurant. Then Tino blinks, and the mess of colors and evil vibes dissolve into someone tall, and blond, and leaning over Tino, and still kind of terrifying. Does the Italian secret police really let their goon squad dress like golf instructors? Does Italy have a secret police? If Italy’s secret police is full of golf instructors in lime green polos, then who actually teaches all of the golf? How come Tino instinctually assumes anyone more threatening than a middle-aged man with a handbag the size of a small dog is part of the secret police?

The owner of the voice grumbles some other things, and swipes a hand across Tino’s forehead before leaning back. “You sure?”

“Please don’t kill me,” Tino replies, sitting up. “Damn, I really have been here too long.”

Frowning, the owner of the voice growls out something else. Under any other ( _normal_ ) circumstances, Tino would assume the sounds mean ‘I am going to kill you with my bare hands, just like they taught me in secret police training camp. The polo is a disguise.’ Tino’s blood alcohol level is too high for normal circumstances, though. He doesn’t cringe. Instead, he wobbles to his feet and breaks into the best manic customer service smile he can manage. Hopefully it will be his last.

Customer service smile.

Not smile.

Tino honestly doesn’t want to die.

“You wanna know what’s in the box?”

The stranger nods.

“Well,” because it might also be a broken end table, “so do I.”

They stand.

The stranger stares.

Tino hopes it’s almost six, because that’s when he gets to leave. It’s a small miracle that nobody’s reported him yet, after the way he’s been acting all day, but he honestly doesn’t care one way or another. The ‘goodbye fuckers’ feeling of quitting a shitty job is flowing too sharply in Tino’s veins. That and the vodka.

“… _sure_ you’re feelin’ fine?”

It’s been at least half an hour since Tino threw up behind anything. Does… that count? As feeling fine? Who is this lime jackfruit asking anyway? “I’m…”

The stranger stares.

Tino sways.

“I…”

The stranger continues to stare.

Tino continues to sway.

“I _am_ —”

Maybe his face just looks like that.

Tino leans forward, drapes his right arm around the stranger’s shoulder, and whispers “ _Moomintroll_ ” into the stranger’s left ear. Then he passes out.

When he wakes up next, the first thing Tino sees is the much closer ceiling in the staff break room. He head hurts a little, and his mouth tastes like a fish left out to die on a wet sheet of cardboard. There are distinct notes of mold. A trace of slime. And, again, someone is standing too far into Tino’s comfort zone; this time it’s his manager.

“There you are,” she says, “you’re lucky your friend noticed your fever, Va—Ve…… Gino.”

“Tino,” he sighs. She’s always getting it wrong.

“Yes, that,” she waves her right hand and throws something on top of Tino’s face. There goes that lovely stark yellow ceiling, covered up by something white and cotton, and most likely Tino’s jacket. What a shame. Not. “Well, tell Berwald we’re very thankful he noticed your condition. Here at the IKEA family…”

She prattles on about care and attention, and not infecting customers, and Tino doesn’t listen while he sits up and lets his coat fall from his face. He’s heard it all before, and it’s even worse with the headache. At least his head is the only thing that hurts. “Is it six?”

“Just past.”

Tino undoes his apron, throws it behind his shoulder, hopes it falls on the stove, and walks out of the room. IKEA will deposit his last paycheck electronically. They have their apron, and their show floors; they don’t have Tino’s spirit. On his way through the staff parking lot, to the bus stop behind, Tino skips. He whistles. He laughs at the cars of the people he hates the most ( _Amedeo from Kitchens, that reindeer dick plant_ ). He’s free.

He has no idea who the fuck Berwald is, when he recalls the last things his ex-manager said to him, but anyone who doesn’t report Tino for public intoxication can’t be all that bad. Tonight Tino will drink to never having to set foot in a flat pack furniture store ever again, and to Berwald.

Whoever he is.

**Author's Note:**

> Life has been very hectic lately, but things should simmer down soon for a while. While this is _not_ the fic I thought I would post next in this series, it was easier to finish than that one. I’m hoping to get that one out soonish. There are some parts in it I’m no longer happy with. But I digress! This fic sets the stage for some side characters! Namely, the awkward and difficult love story of Berwald, Set Designer at Vargas Films, and Tino, Has Porn-Free Jobs. These two won’t be able to keep away from each other whether they want to ( _Tino_ ), or not ( _Berwald_ ).
> 
>  **Piazza Something Something near the Via Something-io:** I swear I was going to give him a legitimate neighborhood. I had GoogleMaps open and everything. But when I was about to start seeing which neighborhoods near ‘ikea rome’ were income-appropriate, I realized effort. Why am I putting in all this effort?
> 
>  **Timo:** a nod to Himaruya’s creative naming choices. Hey, man, at least you aren’t a beach or a dog.
> 
>  **I’m Moomintroll:** watch the video linked at the top :D


End file.
